NOAA outlook for spring: Drought to continue, intensify in the West
Submitted by Jeff Munson on Thu, 03/19/2015 - 11:12am
NOAA’s Spring Outlook released Thursday predicts widespread drought conditions to persist in Nevada, California and Oregon this spring as the dry season begins.
“Periods of record warmth in the West and not enough precipitation during the rainy season cut short drought-relief in California this winter and prospects for above average temperatures this spring may make the situation worse,” said Jon Gottschalck, chief, Operational Prediction Branch, NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center.
El Niño finally arrived in February, but forecasters say it’s too weak and too late in the rainy season to provide much relief for Nevada and California which will soon reach the fourth year of drought.
The outlook doesn't appear to get better, either. Drought is expected to persist in California, Nevada, and Oregon through June with the onset of the dry season in April. Drought is also forecast to develop in remaining areas of Oregon and western Washington. Drought is also likely to continue in parts of the southern Plains.
Forecasters say drought improvement or removal is favored for some areas in the Southwest, southern Rockies, southern Plains, and Gulf Coast while drought development is more likely in parts of the northern Plains, upper Mississippi Valley and western Great Lakes where recent dryness and an outlook of favored below average precipitation exist.
Current water supply forecasts and outlooks in the western U.S. range from near normal in the Pacific Northwest, northern Rockies, and Upper Colorado, to, much below normal in California, the southern Rockies, and portions of the Great Basin.
The Sierra Nevada snowpack, which Californians rely on heavily during the dry summer months for their water needs, continued to disappoint this winter. The snowpack’s water content this year is historically low for March, according to the California Department of Water Resources.
Only in 1991 was the water content of the snowpack lower – 18 percent of that early-March average. Manual surveys of 180 snow courses this year reveal even less water content – just 13 percent of the early-March average, the lowest in DWR’s records for this time of year. The difference between electronic and manual surveys is explained by the higher elevation of most electronic sensors, where they receive more snow than many of the lower-elevation snow courses.
If the drought persists as predicted in the Far West, it will likely result in an active wildfire season, continued stress on crops due to low reservoir levels, and an expansion of water conservation measures. More information about drought can be found at www.drought.gov.
